


Experiments

by Pyrephox



Category: Crimson Peak (2015)
Genre: Child Abuse, F/M, Pre-Canon, Spoilers, pre-incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-17
Updated: 2015-10-17
Packaged: 2018-04-26 18:12:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5014975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pyrephox/pseuds/Pyrephox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lucille experiments with the power of a kiss.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Experiments

Lucille was ten the first time she kissed her brother. Truly kissed him, not a forehead-kiss as he required after nightmares, or a cheek-kiss as a reward for giving her a new toy built with his clever little hands. It was on a cold, clear day in autumn. They had snuck down into the library to read books. Thomas sprawled to her left on belly and forearms, scribbling notes about some mechanical contraption or another. Lucille sat with her back against Father’s desk, reading and watching the door in case either of their parents came investigating the noises of children where they were not supposed to be. 

The book in her hands was one of Mother’s. It even smelled like her, that faint camphor-and-perfume scent that made a trail in the air behind her and soaked into the house’s walls in the few times a year she was in residence. Lucille brought the book up to her face and breathed in deep. It was a terrible smell. And a terrible book, all things considered – all about love and romance and other lies. One only had to look at Mother and Father to see that. She read another passage, and grimaced. The heroine was perfectly useless, and obsessed with a man she’d barely met, simply because they’d shared a kiss. Was that what tied Mother to Father through the rages and the purplish bruises that bloomed on her arms and neck whenever they were too long trapped together in the mansion?

A kiss? It could not be so powerful as all of that, surely?

She eyed Thomas. “Come here,” she said, uncoiling herself from around the book and beckoning with a languid hand. Being Thomas, he came, his eyes wide with curiosity. “Sit,” she said, and beckoned at the scarred wood before her. Once he’d settled down, she scooted closer, until their knees were touching. The Mother-smell of the book wafted up between them. She leaned forward, reaching for his mouth with her own.

He recoiled at the touch of their lips. “What are you—“

“Hush, Thomas. It’s an experiment. Like in your books.”

“None of my books require kissing,” he said, with as much disdain as an eight year old could muster.

“Yes, well. I read different books. You remember when I helped you with that dreadful gadget and it cut my hand?” She showed him the scar on her palm, thrusting it forward until he squirmed with guilt. “I helped you with your experiment. Now you help me with mine.”

He stared at the mark on her hand, then licked his lips and nodded. “I just have to sit here?”

That was not what the man in the book had done, but Lucille figured it would work for now. Once she knew how it worked, she’d tell Thomas how to do it properly. She lunged forward before he could change his mind. His lips were cold and a little wet, and their noses scraped until she figured out how to tilt his head to the side so that she could mash their mouths together. Thomas made a sound of protest, but she grabbed his head and held him in place until she had to breathe.

He looked at her with wounded eyes. “You smooshed my lips.”

“You weren’t doing it right.” He seemed no more bound to her than he always had been. And she…well, hadn’t there been something? Something fluttering deep within her, like the moths she trapped under glass, to watch them dance their ways to death on the most boring days? 

As she pondered this, Thomas pouted, lifting a hand to rub at his mouth. “How would I know how to do it right? They’re your books.”

Lucille scowled. If the kiss had failed, it could not be her fault. “They’re Mother’s books. And they’re stupid. Just like her.”

Thomas hissed under his breath, and glanced at the door. “Don’t say that. What if she hears you?”

“I don’t care.” That was a lie, but it was one that set a giddy, defiant shiver running through her body. “They’re stupid. Stupid.” Each repetition of the word was like gas in a dirigible, making her lighter, until she thought she might fly. She grabbed the book in her lap, with its awful (stupid) Mother-smell, and threw it against the wall as hard as she could. It fluttered on brown and beige wings through the air, spine snapping and pages scattering. The slap of the leather cover against the wall was shockingly loud.

Thomas gaped at her. In horror, but in admiration, as well. Seeing that in his eyes made her look down, to see if her feet were still on the rotting floorboards. “You’re going to get a beating,” he said, solemnly. The sound of approaching footsteps suggested he was right.

“I don’t care,” she said, again, even as a cold sweat broke out along her spine. She began to sink back to Earth. “Run, Thomas. Go up to the attic and don’t open the door until I tell you to.”

Thomas ran, of course. Slipping out of the other door just as an angry Father came bursting through. Lucille met him chin up and hands balled into fists, ensuring he looked nowhere but at her defiance.

When he’d finished, she had to crawl three flights up the stairs, scratching like a dog at the attic door to be let in. Thomas pulled her inside, stripped the clothes from the bloody welts and helped her bathe. Afterwards, they huddled together in the bed, under the same blankets, and he whispered to her of valor and love and other words he barely understood.

Lucille clung to him for a while, the soft push of his breath over her bare skin. Eventually, when he’d run out of words to say, she whispered back. 

“Let’s try it again.”


End file.
